The
IFPI, RIAA, MPAA, and their international allies have led a crusade
against copyright infringement over the last decade, which has
seen record
million dollar verdicts handed down against citizens for
essentially petty theft. Now, even as they continue
their lawsuits, they eagerly await gaining new sets of
legislated tools thanks to the lobbyist money they've been pouring
into governments worldwide.

We previously detailed
how the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement, set to be debated by the
U.S. Congress later this year, currently contains a new crime called
"imminent infringement", which is essentially
copyright thoughtcrime.

Now courts in the Netherlands have
added speechcrime to that list, essentially ruling that is illegal to
even talk or write about piracy. The case began last year when
Dutch movie studio Eyeworks sued a Usenet community FTD for "making
public" their film Komt
een vrouw bij de dokter (A
Woman At The Doctor).

Typically "making public"
means you uploaded a file and shared it. In some cases, the
definition has been extended to posting links to infringed material.
However, in this case FTD's users neither posted copyrighted material
nor links to it, they merely would "spot" locations of
various films on Usenet and post them to the group (sans-links).

In
May, in Dutch Federal court in the Hague FTD was handed a defeat.
The court issued an "ex parte injunction" banning the
site's users from "spotting" under threat of
punishment.

The FTD's lawyer Arnoud Engelfriet filed an
objection (appeal) to the court order. That objection was heard
last week and FTD lost yet again when Dutch court essentially ruled a
second time that free speech did not cover talking about or writing
about piracy.

Speaking
withTorrentFreak Engelfriet
voiced his frustration, stating, "I am flabbergasted by the
court’s reasoning. It is established case law that publishing
hyperlinks or torrents (Mininova, Pirate Bay) is *not* the same as a
publication. FTD does less than
what Mininova or Pirate Bay does, but according to the court we are
more liable than they are?"

The Judge supported his
decision citing a case in England involving a Usenet service called
Newzbin. Engelfriet describes, "They say that FTD is doing
the same thing, and since the English courts held Newzbin liable for
infringement, FTD must be liable too. This completely ignores
the technical differences between Newzbin and FTD. Newzbin is an NZB
search engine through which you find codes to directly download from
Usenet. FTD is a forum where people ’spot’ movies using messages
in ordinary Dutch."

The FTD's unsuccessful defense was
that it did not control the servers the material was hosted on and
hand no control over potential downloaders and thus was not "making
available". The court said this was inconsequential and
that guilt would be determined by establishing "whether the
behavior of FTD allows users to download copyrighted files (in an
easier manner) and thus makes such files available to the public."
And the court found they did.

Tim Kuik, director of Dutch
copyright protection group BREIN cheered the decision, stating, "This
is a collaboration between FTD and its users where they knowingly
provide access to unauthorized files. It’s clear that this is
more than just talking about files like FTD wants people to
believe."

Brein is suing the FTD in a second court case.
That case will go to court in October. Kuik wants to see FTD
shut down entirely and taken off the internet.

FTD may soon
have a bit of vengeance, though. Dutch elections are this week,
and due to decisions like this one and the Sweden's multi-million
dollar verdict against the owners of The
Pirate Bay,
the Pirate Party is picking up steam. Writes a
party spokesperson, "When reaching landmark decisions that
overturn years of jurisprudence, neither the judge nor the issue is
served when it turns out that the judge in question is in business
with the copyright-lawyer from the party benefiting from this
shocking verdict. The fact that this joint enterprise mainly offers
courses on 'counter-piracy' at €900 per day, makes the situation
appear even muddier still. If the Netherlands wants to avoid looking
like a banana-republic where the law is for sale to the highest
bidder, it is urgent that parliament takes control of the debate on
copyright-reform, and brings it back into the public arena where this
discussion belongs."

It has been established that the
judge serving on The
Pirate Bay case
was a member
of copyright organizations and may have financially
benefited from the decision. The
Pirate Bay admins
are currently appealing
the case, hoping for a more unbiased day in court. Despite
the seemingly liberal nature of the Netherlands it has been leading
the way in copyright enforcement, banningThe
Pirate Bay and
other sites entirely.

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Piracy is like piracy as piracy was piracy. Piracy is piracy and pirates pirate with piracy. Piracy of music is piracy and piracy. Piracy of movies is like piracy of music. Piracy of games is like pirating pirates. Piracy of rectums is like piracy of speech.

I find that Ironic since the whole Anti-piracy push (and all the pressure resultant from it) that lead to this debacle originated in the "land of the free".

The US government wanted to keep the whole damned thing secret until it was enacted as law in all of the participating nations. Here in Canada, the request for information on it in wound up going all the way to the supreme court before it was finally OK'd. This lead to the Canadian governments backpedaling (much to the disappointment of the US) for almost a year after the public outcry.

So before you poopoo the Dutch, you might want to look at your own governments desire to be able to search, seize and destroy electronics at customs solely on the suspicion that it contains infringing materials. The US governments toadying to the RIAA and MPAA is where the impetus for this whole mess came from.

While our own Government has not been innocent (when has it ever?), they can not bar our right to talk about things unless they amend our constitution to absolve the first amendment. In order to do that, they'd have to remove the second amendment also.

It won't be the government that controls what you can discuss, it will be businesses. They'll control what you can say to protect their profits. For example, The Tech Report bans people for discussing ad blockers.

That's always been the case. Freedom of speech only guarantees that the government won't impede your right to say whatever absurb thing trips your trigger..... within limits.

However, if you stand in someone's house and expound on your opinion that his daughter is a slut.... he has the right to evict you.

Same with a web site. It's not public space, so they are free to put whatever restrictions they like on their forums, etc. If you don't like their restrictions, it's your right to take your custom elsewhere.

Well said Mr. Blastman. And I'm going to get auto-rated down, but I'll say it anyway.

Let any motherfucker in power that wants to even try to dick with either amendment just try it and and be a personal witness to the shit storm they induce. I'll take a free American redneck over a pushed over conforming Dutchman any day.

most of these "revolutionists" are just big talkers who also believe that if its called the patriot act, it must be patriotic!!!

you know thats a big part of why alot of people voted for it, they just didnt have the time to read and understand the act, so rather then risk not getting re-elected due to people bringing up how UN-patriotic they are(because they didnt vote for it) they just caved in to bush admin and voted it into law.

Im sad to say I am american, our govt caters to the mpaa/riaa and anybody else who has the money to pay the right people off....

i just need to win the lotto and move to a nice island someplace where I wont have to deal with this crap :P

As an American i totally agree with you on this. Our government is in the back pocket of big business. Our politicians are as corrupt as they come. It is big business and the top 2 percent of the richest people in this country who determine policy. And now with a recent supreme court ruling regarding election campaign contributions big business has solidified its hold over the government. No politician will dare oppose this for fear that the lobbyists will back the incumbent's challenger who may be willing to play ball. It's a sad state of affairs in this country today, with the left and the right, and those who think they are totally free are dead wrong.

Android will eventually become a completely closed platform to protect profits. Also, Google will eventually filter out piracy sites (and sites that discuss piracy) from their search results to protect profits as well.

At the risk of agreeing with reader1, I don't believe he's espousing the belief that money is more important than freedom, but rather that in many ways, it is the current state of affairs in the US. Unfortunately in most cases, those that have the money make the laws.

quote: At the risk of agreeing with reader1, I don't believe he's espousing the belief that money is more important than freedom, but rather that in many ways, it is the current state of affairs in the US. Unfortunately in most cases, those that have the money make the laws.

Belay that...I just read some of reader1's comments down the page. I don't think he was being as insightful as I gave him credit for. My bad.

With "public ownership" or "common ownership" of society, you beg the increased intrusion of demand of rights and equality by all. Thus so, you accomplish the extraordinary task of catering to everyones point of view, thus, in order to avoid conflict, you have to stifle and extinguish everyone's point of view in the end in order to achieve true equality .

Thereby, Socialism has everything to do with freedom (or lack of) speech.

Though I see your point, there is always going to be a difference between censoring specific language which is deemed indecent and censoring ideas (like poitical speech, or speech about piracy for that matter). Yes, most people can't distinguish the difference between the 2 but courts of law should be able to.

But these US bashers are right about one thing. We gave up our some of our rights when we valued creativity and convenience OVER freedom.

Americans break the laws of foreign countries all day long here, within our borders. I don't see all of America being put in front of judges for all of these crimes. This is why we have our own country, our own laws and our own national borders here.

If we set foot within a foreign countries borders, however, then, if we commit a crime against their laws while in their country, it is a completely different story and their laws do in fact apply.

sounds like a failure to enforce laws on the part of your police. I don't expect to be immune from local laws when i travel. i can't just drive on the right (read double meaning) side of the road in the UK and get away with it just because I am an American.

quote: 2) There is no such thing as free speech in the US; say "bomb" in an airport

That is way out of bounds bro.That is like saying there is no food in my fridge because I can't eat the plastic that the turkey is in.

And look up the first amendment on wikipedia and you'll understand how bad that statement is. There are certain words that are protected for safety's sake. There are also words that are considered indecent. But you can feel free to use either of them in the privacy of your own home and in other places (like movie sets lol).

Quit throwing around Fox News buzz words that you don't understand. This isn't socialism it's FACISM! The government is working for and with corporate interests. Even if much of Europe is socialist it doesn't mean that this particular case represents socialism.

I don't have time to watch Fox News (or much of any other news channel) for that matter right now. I have a newborn at home that cries a lot--much like you are doing right now with no freakin' clue about what they are taking about.

Keep throwing desperate crap into the air trying to pin something on someone. The reality is some of us have figured out how to think on our own, independently, without being fed something.

Oh, and, by the way, how on earth did you figure you could inject Fox into the mix here where it hasn't been mentioned at all. Perhaps, it is not I but you that are the lamb being lead to the slaughter among the herd.

Fox news was most likely thrown in because it has a lot of similar wordbuzzes and "logic" not to unsimmilar to what you said yourself.I furthermore believe the freedom of speech is a policy of democracy and not capitalism so why do so many attack SOCIALISM when freedom are decreased?

I believe the ONLY "freedom" you loose in a socialistical influenced market is the taxation...I have to pay taxes for the public services the government provides, private enterprise exists as a competition to the service provided by the government and my freedom as an individual is affected how?

I can clearly tell that the Europeans are becoming enraged at all the attacks towards Socialism when then they have to resort to nitpicking wikipedia entries in order to somehow try and separate their nations economies from the oppressive systems they have in place to impose upon their citizens freedoms. It makes me chuckle.

We might not be perfect here in America (we aren't) but I'd much rather have a free society protected by our constitution any day.

Oh, and by the way, the United States is not a democracy, if you want to nitpick. We are a Republic. True and pure democracies eventually lead towards oppressive practices in order to cater to all of its citizens whims.

I don't quite know what you refer to by the wikipedia quote thingie, however I dont really get enraged though you may not have directly refered to me on that one.To me the different system are choices that either of has far from proven to be the best as of yet, they both have huge flaws.I support a mixed market purely out of humanitarian reasons but regardless of a pure capitalistic or socialistic system, freedom of speech is not affected by it.OTHER elements is what plays in for individual freedom and I'm getting a bit shocked that so many mixes that up.

I know, republic, i was throwing democracy more or less as a generalization there (I have to point out though, republic is a bit generalising word as well as there are a ton of ways to implement that, as well ;)

What "opressive systems" are you refering to? I'd argue the US is far more oppressive; for instance, they don't have a situation where an insurance company says "Nope, we won't cover that".

The fact that you can make that statement is even funnier when you realize the US has been Socalist for well over a century now [Minimum wage, 40 hour work week, disability pay, etc. All mandated by the government].

That is about the most ignorant statement I think I've heard you make in a while.

quote: for instance, they don't have a situation where an insurance company says "Nope, we won't cover that".

You're right, they _do_ cover everything... eventually. IF you live long enough, you'll get medical care. Their system purposely makes certain patients wait extended periods of time hoping they'll die off so they don't have to provide medical service.

Here--they (the doctors and hospitals) have an obligation to help practically everyone if they need medical care. Eventually, those who can pay do pay for it one way or another (increased premiums or medical costs) but at least people get service.

quote: US has been Socalist for well over a century now

It has? Since when? Lets see:

1. I can still own my own company.2. I still file my own taxes every year to declare how much I owe.3. I still can choose where I work and what career path I take.4. I can choose whether I go to college or not and what to major in, regardless of my previous performance in school.

Hmm, those all sounds like the tenets of a free society and capitalism. Shall I name more?

quote: It has? Since when? Lets see: 1. I can still own my own company. 2. I still file my own taxes every year to declare how much I owe. 3. I still can choose where I work and what career path I take. 4. I can choose whether I go to college or not and what to major in, regardless of my previous performance in school.

The tenents of socialism don't prevent that either.You CAN implement it that drastically but I cant see anyone who'd be interested in that these days, just as you COULD privatize police and firemen in a capitalistic model as well, but yet again no one is really interested in that.

I think what Mr. B was drawing from this is that with both Socialism and Fascism the individual's freedom is decreased significantly or eliminated altogether. (If you don't believe me just ask one of the 400K people who starved to death in 1892 tzarist Russia, the 15 million victims of the Holocaust, or the millions who were executed in mid-20th century China.)

My point is that though he is factually wrong, his defense of freedom is spot on.

quote: I believe the ONLY "freedom" you loose in a socialistical influenced market is the taxation... I have to pay taxes for the public services the government provides, private enterprise exists as a competition to the service provided by the government and my freedom as an individual is affected how?

There is no 'private enterprise' in socialism. It all belongs to everyone. So the freedom you lose is is the freedom of choice that you mention. Why don't people get this? Socialism might be a great idea if we all thought alike as it aims for peak efficiency. But freedom gives us more innovation which can also create efficiencies. I don't know if I said that right, but I think you can catch my drift.

Both socialism and communism are based on the principle that the goods and services produced in an economy should be owned publicly, and controlled and planned by a centralized organization. Socialism asserts that the distribution should take place according to the amount of individuals' production efforts, however, while communism asserts that that goods and services should be distributed among the populace according to individuals' needs.

Another difference between socialism and communism is that communists assert that both capitalism and private ownership of the means of production must be done away with as soon as possible in order to make sure a classless society, the communist ideal, is formed. Socialists, however, see capitalism as a possible part of the ideal state and believe that socialism can exist in a capitalist society. In fact, one of the ideas of socialism is that everyone within the society will benefit from capitalism as much as possible as long as the capitalism is controlled somehow by a centralized planning system.

Another difference between socialism and communism is centered on who controls the structure of economy. Where socialism generally aims to have as many people as possible influence how the economy works, communism seeks to limit that number to a smaller group.

I'm sorry, WHAT? :PI live in country currently governed by social democracy and in this country I created and ran 2 companies that together provided me with "daily bread" for together 6 years!

quote: There is no 'private enterprise' in socialism.

It was a government office that aided me for free in all i needed to know and do (in terms of documentation, filing, requirement for certain types of company forms like AS or limited responsibility etc, legal rights and requirements etc) because I couldnt afford a bussiness lawyer, and I even got a government sponsorship once I had proven that I had a product and a consept that would turn a profit...

Do you see how bizarre your suggestion gets here?I can at best accept that socialism as a generalisation for the tens of different ways to use it has SOME WAYS you can implement it that limites certain freedoms, for example you can make it illegal to have private enterprise competing against state in certain areas like healthcare or education because for example you say that healthcare should be equal for everyone.But I do by no means accept the so typical american generalisation that socialism = communism, they are VASTLY different.I am lucky to live in one of the worlds richest country, its a very socialistic country called Norway, and although HIGHLY socialistic (free education, free healthcare, equality as a core, EVERYONE working or not has the right to income defended by LAW, EVERYONE is guarantered a high quality of life again by LAW) and based on polls less than 4% of the population supports communism.

What??? REALLY?You think its splitting hair to suggest that fascism and socialism dont go hand in hand as "proven" by the suggestion that since the nazigermany's political party was called the national socialist party and were practicing fascist policies, socialism and fascism is the same?

And what the heck is this "100%" nonsense?His claim was complete ludicrious and strongly uneducated and he further ridicule the argument by making a suggestion that his thoughts would have been proven under any education that incorporated ww2..Its a fallacy of grose generalization and and a exceptionally dumb conclusion.

- Capitalism is an economic system in which the means of production are privately owned; supply, demand, price, distribution, and investments are determined mainly by private decisions in the free market, rather than through a planned economy; and profit is distributed to owners who invest in businesses.

- Fascism, pronounced, is a radical and authoritarian nationalist political ideology.Fascists seek to organize a nation according to corporatist perspectives, values, and systems, including the political system and the economy.